Traitor Angels

by Anne Blankman

  Twenty-Seven

  I WOKE IN DARKNESS. MY CHEEK WAS PRESSED against something cold and hard, my body shaking with a rhythmic rocking, as though I lay on the bottom of a boat. But I didn’t hear the sound of water slapping the gunwales, nor smell the Thames, salt mixed with mud. Where was I?

  My eyes opened wider. All that greeted me was a uniform blackness. Dear God, what had happened to me—had I finally inherited Father’s blindness? Terror stole my voice, and all I could let out was a muffled moan.

  Under my cheek, the stiff surface seemed to rise slightly, pushing against my face for the space of a heartbeat, settling down, and then starting the process again. Below me, I heard the unmistakable sound of iron wheels rattling on pavers. I was lying on the floor of a carriage, I realized. It was the unevenly laid paving stones that were jolting me.

  For a long moment, I lay motionless. Unending blackness pressed heavily on my eyes. Why couldn’t I see? Had Sir Gauden’s fist knocked my eyes loose in their sockets?

  Please, God, anything but that. If I couldn’t see, I was powerless. I blinked hard several times, my eyelashes brushing against a soft obstruction of some sort. Scarcely daring to breathe, I turned my attention inward, focusing on my body. There was something wrapped around my head. A blindfold? Yes, that was it; now that I lay quietly I could feel the edges of the fabric cutting into my cheeks. I hadn’t lost my vision. I swallowed a sob, hating myself for the way relief flowed through my limbs, making me weak all over.

  Clearly Robert and his friends didn’t want me to know where they were taking me. Very well, then. I would have to use my remaining senses to figure out what was happening.

  Gently I flexed my hands. Something rough and scratchy had immobilized my wrists, and I could rotate them only a few degrees before any further movement was impeded. Ropes. Robert and his companions had tied me up.

  I lay still, listening with every fiber of my being. The groan of a wooden seat, perhaps responding to someone shifting his position. A throat being cleared.

  I wasn’t alone.

  The thought made the pain in my jaw explode with white-hot intensity. I couldn’t hold back a gasp.

  “Ah, you’re awake.” It was Sir Gauden. “Good. I was afraid you would be knocked out for hours, which would be exceedingly tiresome as we have many matters to discuss with you.”

  “Where’s Robert?” I muttered, waves of agony pulsing in my jaw.

  “Robert?” A foot nudged me in the side. “If you mean the Duke of Lockton, then I wonder at your audacity in calling him by his Christian name. His Grace thanks you for the vial, by the way, and he’s waiting for you to provide him with the location of Galileo’s cave.”

  The cave? Why did they care where it was? My stomach tightened. Robert must want to find it in order to destroy it—or to bottle the liquid for himself. But why did he and his men think I knew where to find it?

  “Galileo’s cave?” My words came out as slurred as a drunkard’s; my lips felt swollen and thick. Curse Sir Gauden and his fist. I ran a considering tongue along my teeth. Thankfully, none of them felt loose.

  Sir Gauden barked out a laugh. “Your father hid clues in Paradise Lost, didn’t he? So perhaps he hid the exact location of the cave in his poem. As he is unfortunately secreted away at His Majesty’s pleasure, that leaves you as the sole person capable of figuring out where the cave can be found.”

  So this was the reason I was alive: I was still valuable to them.

  My throat was so dry I couldn’t swallow. “Please,” I whispered, “I know nothing—”

  Hands seized the bodice of my gown and hauled me to a sitting position. Sir Gauden’s breath was hot on my face. “You had better hope that’s a lie,” he said. “Or I can promise that you don’t have much time left for this world. His Grace wants to find the cave before he takes the crown.”

  The words hit me as hard as a fist in the face. This was what Robert had wanted all along—to be king. His illegitimacy would keep him forever trapped in his position as the Duke of Lockton . . . unless he had a powerful weapon in his arsenal.

  “Is he planning on blackmailing the king—exchanging the vial and the cave’s location for the throne?” As soon as I had spoken I knew I had to be wrong, for Sir Gauden released his hold on me and started to laugh. I sagged against the wedge of something hard—the edge of the carriage’s cushioned seat, I guessed. Someone’s leg brushed my shoulder; I was surrounded by these men.

  “What nonsense,” Gauden chuckled. “No, His Grace will prove to his people that he is the rightful king. He’ll stand on the steps of St. Paul’s and, as crowds gather to watch, he will die.”

  “What?” I cried.

  “His other dearest friends and I have been given the honor of killing him,” Sir Gauden continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Four of them will pierce his hands and his feet. I will stab him in the side.”

  Icy awareness trickled into my mind. “You are going to reenact the death of Christ,” I breathed.

  “His death and his resurrection,” Gauden corrected. “His Grace will die in full view of dozens of people in the street. Three days later, while his body is lying in state in Westminster Abbey, we’ll pour the contents of the vial down his throat. And he will live again.”

  “That’s wicked!” I cried. “You’re making a mockery of our faith—all for the sake of a crown!”

  Gauden went on as if I hadn’t spoken. “Can you imagine what the populace will do? They will think he’s the Second Coming, the King of Kings, returned to save us all! They’ll demand that he assume the throne. His Grace will be the greatest and most powerful king in the world.”

  A sick feeling cramped my stomach. In my mind, I saw Robert in the Bodleian Library, his eyes intent on mine. I consider the English to be my people, and I would battle my father to protect them, he had said.

  It had been the truth. I merely hadn’t understood the true meaning behind his words.

  Angry tears burned my eyes, wetting the blindfold and making the fabric stick to my skin. “How could he do this to us—”

  “His Grace said to explain everything to you,” Sir Gauden interrupted. “I daresay he thinks an enlightened prisoner is more likely to be forthcoming than an ignorant one, and His Grace is right in all things. What do you wish to know?”

  “Does the king know what Robert—His Grace, I mean—is plotting?”

  I could hear the smile in Gauden’s voice. “The king is a fool. When Mr. Wren found Mr. Galilei’s story hidden in St. Paul’s a fortnight ago, he immediately presented it to the king. The king didn’t comprehend the true significance of the account—he stupidly believed Mr. Milton was involved in a nefarious plot involving Italians and decided to dispatch a spy to watch Mr. Milton’s London home. It wasn’t long before a Florentine appeared at the house, seeking Mr. Milton’s company, and word was brought to all of us at court.”

  A Florentine—Antonio. The space within the left side of my rib cage tightened. No, I mustn’t think of him or I would break.

  “The king sent his most trusted friends to Chalfont St. Giles, to arrest your father and learn precisely what sort of treasonous activities he was plotting with foreigners,” Sir Gauden continued. “I need hardly tell you that the Italian city-states pose a terrible danger to our country—these Catholic nations have grown populous and powerful, and England is still weakened by her years of civil war and warring governments.”

  “My father is a loyal Englishman! He would never concoct a treasonous scheme.”

  I tensed, waiting for the slap that must surely come. Instead the men muttered angrily. “Mr. Milton is no patriot.” “He advocated the beheading of our beloved King Charles the First!”

  “Tut, tut, let’s not argue about the past.” Sir Gauden sounded amused. “If a king-killer’s daughter wants to pretend her father is a good man, there’s little we can say to convince her otherwise. At any rate, Miss Milton, His Grace was sitting with the king when Mr. Wren brought them word of the stran
ge discovery in St. Paul’s. His Grace at once realized the true significance of a liquid that can revive the dead. He summoned men he thought were his friends—Sir Vaughan and his assistants—and together they sped to Chalfont St. Giles.”

  He paused for breath. “Do you remember how Galileo’s account of the cave was ripped? His Grace saw it before the king tore it up. There was a notation at the end, made by your father some twenty years ago. He was afraid future generations might not figure out that he planned to immortalize Galileo’s story in a poem he would create someday, and so he was writing his intentions there. He wanted to call the poem Paradise Lost and turn himself, Galileo, and Galileo’s apprentice, Vincenzo Viviani, into three of the angel characters.”

  So that was why my attacker outside Oxford had called the three of them “traitor angels”! He’d already known about my father’s intention to weave himself and the two Italian natural philosophers into the story. As a man immovably loyal to the king, of course he would have seen my father and his colleagues as false, or traitor, angels, who were trying to discredit the Son of God—and destroy the divine right of kings.

  “From there,” Gauden said, “I imagine you can figure out the rest.”

  I nodded. Robert and his companions had arrived in Chalfont St. Giles soon after Antonio and I had departed. They had forced or connived our location out of Francis Sutton, who must have drawn them a replica of the map he had made for me, so Robert could race after us, finding us before we reached Oxford. Meanwhile, his companions had ridden ahead using another route. They had known to wait for us at the Bodleian, for I had asked Francis a number of questions about the library, and it must have been obvious to them where we were headed. Parts of the story Robert had told us had been true, slender strands he interwove with falsehoods until they formed a rich tapestry.

  But then his plans had unraveled.

  “Robert’s friends betrayed him,” I said.

  “All along, they were loyal to the king!” There was no trace of amusement in Gauden’s voice now, only rage. “They tricked His Grace—overtaking all of you outside the city and stealing the vial from him. But it was God’s will that you reached London first,” he went on in a changed tone. “His Grace was able to question Royal Society members about those turncoats without letting you and the Florentine catch on to his true intentions. Yes, he made it all seem very natural, didn’t he?” he asked when I winced. “His Grace is quite clever. He knows that a much larger supply of the elixir lies within the cave outside Padua. And you’ll help him find it, Miss Milton.”

  He rested his gloved hand on the curve where my neck met my shoulder, and he squeezed slightly. “Sir Vaughan and his men were killed before they could give their report to the king. His Grace’s plan is still a secret from his father . . . but the king must suspect they have become enemies. Even if he can’t prove it yet, he must be watching His Grace closely.”

  My hands twisted in the ropes; I was yearning to break free. If only I could tear off this cursed blindfold, I wouldn’t feel so helpless. The darkness pressed down on me, as warm and dry as kindling. I tilted my head back, seeking a sliver of space between the blindfold and my cheek, just a narrow opening through which I could see. But there was nothing.

  “Why are you helping His Grace?” I asked. “Can’t you see what he’s doing is wrong?”

  Sir Gauden must have brought his face close to mine, for I felt the whisper of his stubble on my cheek. “After King Charles the First was beheaded, I had to flee to Europe like most of the nobility,” he snarled. “For a decade, I lived in horrific poverty, never knowing where the money for my next meal would come from, having to depend on others’ charity to survive. And through it all, I remained loyal to Charles the Second. I believed he was our rightful ruler, and I was ready to suffer for his sake.

  “And what do you think happened when we returned at last to our beloved country? Did the king reward me for my years of devotion? Did he annihilate the men who had caused us such torment? No! Oh, some were put to death, of course, but others he allowed to escape England, and still more, like your father, he permitted to live. He said he couldn’t pardon them but he was tired of death.” Gauden spat the words out. “Ever since then, I’ve known he wasn’t fit to rule. We need a king who isn’t afraid to be ruthless when he needs to be, a king whose claim to the throne is beyond question so another civil war can never happen again.” He paused. “His Grace is that king.”

  “What you want isn’t a king but a tyrant!”

  “You will remember every line of Paradise Lost,” Sir Gauden said as if I hadn’t spoken. He squeezed my neck harder. Gray spots began dancing in the blackness before my eyes. “Every word, every image, Miss Milton. You will figure out what your father hid in his poem.”

  “No,” I said through gritted teeth.

  He slapped me. Fire arced through my cheek, so hot and so sudden that I couldn’t breathe.

  “And what do you say now?” Sir Gauden’s voice was whisper soft.

  I clenched my still-throbbing jaw. “No.”

  And then they were on me, all of them, dragging me down onto the carriage floor and grabbing my arms and legs so I couldn’t fight. A couple of them sat on me; they were so heavy I felt as though I were oozing into the floor.

  “You are alone,” Sir Gauden growled. “Don’t you understand you have been abandoned by everyone? The Florentine that His Grace told us made your eyes shine, is he anywhere to be found? No. He’s at the ball, dancing with beautiful girls—proper girls who don’t wear boys’ clothes or hunger for philosophic knowledge. You must have been a figure of fun to him, Miss Milton.”

  My tears trickled under the blindfold, winding down my face to drip off my chin. “Stop it,” I whispered.

  “Did you truly believe he cared for you?” He laughed. “My poor, misguided Miss Milton. Your Florentine was after Galileo’s elixir, just like the rest of us. The only difference is he had the forethought to romance you in hopes of gaining your assistance.”

  All the fight went out of me. He was right. Antonio had shown his true self in the hall tonight, when he talked to Lady Katherine about using Galileo’s discovery for his own purposes.

  In the end, he had manipulated me as skillfully as Robert had.

  I let out a low cry. Even to my ears, I sounded like a wounded animal. I lay still, listening to the carriage wheels rumble over the road, carrying me closer to whichever place Robert had decreed I should be taken.

  No one spoke. We rolled through the streets, finally stopping when I heard water lapping on a shore. I was hauled to my feet and half carried, half led out of the carriage. The men held me tightly by the elbows. I heard them breathing around me, as though they had hemmed me in on all sides.

  Beneath my feet, the ground felt marshy. The stink of dirty water assailed my nose. Except for the whisper of wind skimming over water, the night was quiet.

  The men holding me dragged me forward. I sagged in their grip, letting them lead me across the soft ground. My legs bumped into something hard. Then I was lifted by several arms and set on my feet on a gently swaying surface. More hands grabbed me, yanking me down onto a seat. We began to move, rocking slightly. The lonely sound of water hitting the sides of a boat reached my ears. I was being rowed somewhere.

  Ahead of us sounded the creaking groan of waterlogged wood and iron. A portcullis gate, I guessed, but I couldn’t bring myself to care; all of my thoughts seemed sluggish, as though they had to travel a long distance before unfurling in my mind. As the boat skimmed onward, water droplets hit my face—dripping off the portcullis spikes as they rose above us, perhaps.

  The boat glided to a stop. For a moment, I remained in place, rocking, while I heard shuffling around me. Then arms were lifting me onto solid ground. From far off, a low, throaty cry rent the night air. I stiffened. It had sounded like a wild animal. Where in Heaven’s name had I been taken?

  The men seized my arms again and marched me forward, our silence broken only b
y their panting as they broke into an almost-run. I had to run, too, or risk falling.

  They rushed me across paved ground, then through a door and up some steps. The stairwell was so narrow my shoulders brushed its sides, and my captors released me so we could climb single file. I had to lift each foot carefully, seeking the flat smoothness of a step.

  Abruptly the man in front of me stopped climbing, and I bumped into him. He grunted. A key rattled in a lock. The man behind me prodded my back, urging me upward. I climbed another few steps before hands gripped my shoulders and threw me to the floor. The side of my body hit stone, the impact knocking the breath from me. I rolled onto my back.

  The door whined shut. I lay motionless, listening. Were they gone?

  No, I heard them breathing. Short, quick inhalations through their noses, as though they were angry or exhausted. Probably they were both. So they hadn’t closed the door in their leave-taking, but had shut it in order to prevent the sounds of our struggles from being overheard.

  Someone moved, the heel of his boot rasping on the floor. “Shall I remove Miss Milton’s blindfold?”

  “Not yet,” said Sir Gauden. “I need her to suffer a little longer.”

  The iciness of the floor seeped through my sleeves and I couldn’t prevent a shiver. I was lying on top of my hands, my clenched fists grinding into the small of my waist. Through my satin sleeves I could sense the shapes of the stones in the floor; they were evenly cut. A finely constructed floor; we were in no hovel, then, or back room of a disreputable inn. Wherever Robert had ordered me taken, the accommodations were impressive. If the floors were stone, then most likely the walls were, too. A clever place to hide me. The stones would muffle my screams.

  I had to bite my lip so I wouldn’t cry out.

  “A few hours of darkness,” Sir Gauden said softly, “and you’ll be ready to do anything we want in return for restoring your sight.” The warm leather of his gloved hand touched my cheek, as gentle as a caress. “Reflect upon your father’s poem. I’m certain you have all the information you need. You only need to put the various pieces together.”